Akademik

(1928- )

   Cinematographer, director, producer, and screenwriter. Agnès Varda is arguably France's most prominent woman director. She was born in Belgium and went to France to study art history at the Ecole du Louvre and later changed her focus to photography at the Ecole de Vaugirard. She worked as the official photographer for the Théâtre National Populaire from 1951 to 1961 before shooting her first auteur film, the feature La Pointe Courte (1954). An independent film shot on location on a low budget, La Pointe Courte was a precursor to the Nouvelle Vague or New Wave, and it was edited by Alain Resnais.

   Varda did not have much experience in cinema when she started her career, yet her first film received accolades from André Bazin. Her next feature, Cléo de 5 à 7 (1961), has been associated with the New Wave, as has the feature Le bonheur (1964), which won the Prix Louis-Delluc. Varda's next feature, Les Créatures (1965), starring Catherine Deneuve and Michel Piccoli, was not generally as well received as her previous features. She shot Lion's Love (1968) while living in California with her husband Jacques Demy. It was followed by L'Une chante, l'autre pas (1976), which recounts the story of two women during different stages of the feminist movement. Sans toit ni loi (1985) is the story of a homeless girl and is one of her best-known feature films. The film won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and a César for its lead actress, Sandrine Bonnaire. Varda moved to California again and directed the feature Documenteur (1981), set in Los Angeles.

   Varda's documentaries are known for their personal, subjective dimensions. One of the most acclaimed, Varda's short Ulysse, was awarded the César for Best Short Documentary. Varda also made a documentary about the actress Jane Birkin, Jane B par Agnès V. (1987). In the same year, she cowrote her feature Kung-Fu Master (1987) with Birkin, who is the leading actress. Another major documentary is Jacquot de Nantes (1991), which focuses on Demy, who died in 1990, as does Les Demoiselles ont eu 25 ans (1992) and L'Univers de Jacques Demy (1993). Among her other feature-length documentaries are Daguerréotypes (1975), Murs Murs (1980), Les Glaneurs et la glaneuse (2000), Les Glaneurs et la glaneuse . . . deux ans après (2002), and Cinévardaphoto (2004). Her film Les Cent et une nuits de Simon Cinéma (1995) was made for the centennial of cinema and features stars such as Michel Piccoli, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Fanny Ardant, Deneuve, and Bonnaire. In addition to directing feature-length films, she directed several shorts, including O saisons, ô châteaux (1957), L'Opéra-Mouffe (1958), Du côté de la côté (1958), Salut les Cubains (1963), Elsa la Rose (1965), Oncle Yanco (1967), Black Panthers (1968), Réponse de femmes (1975), Plaisir d'amour en Iran (1976), Les Dites Caryatides (1984), 7 P., cuis de b . . . à saisir (1984), T'as de beaux escaliers tu sais (1986), Le lion volatile (2003), and Ydessa, les ours et etc. (2004).

   Varda wrote a semi-autobiographical work that encompasses her life and her work, Varda par Agnès (1994). She coined the term cinécriture, a combination of the French words for cinema and writing, to describe a style in filmmaking. Her recent film Les Glaneurs et la glaneuse (2000) and its sequel Les Glaneurs et la glaneuse . . . deux ans après (2002) are both highly acclaimed documentaries dealing with issues ranging from the relationship between the past and the present, the urban and the rural. Both also foreground similarities between people regarded as normal by society and those whom society marginalizes. Her most recent films include Le lion volatil (2003) and Ydessa, les ours et etc. (2004).